$9.2 million funding boost for up to 18 new NP and 40 EN roles in primary care

Project partners can focus not only on increasing the number of Māori and Pacific NPs but also provide wraparound services and ongoing professional development

Primary care is getting funding support to employ up to 18 new nurse practitioners and 40 enrolled nurses in a $9.2 million contract to improve access to mental health and addiction support.

Māori and Pacific populations, along with rural and high needs, are a focus for the national four year Ministry of Health contract awarded recently to the University of Auckland in partnership with the University of Otago, Northland’s Mahitahi Hauora primary health entity and Auckland Pacific provider, The Fono.

The project is linked to the number of places in the Nurse Practitioner Training Programme being boosted from 20 to 50 a year with a new $2.3 million a year contract that includes $750,000 targeted for growing the number of Māori and Pacific NPs.

This means the project partners can focus not only on increasing the number of Māori and Pacific NPs but also provide wraparound services and ongoing professional development to support the new NPs working with local communities, says University of Auckland school of nursing head Julia Slark, in a press release.

It is hoped to have the first of the new NP primary health roles in place before the end of the year, Sue Adams, the national coordinator for the two contracts, told New Zealand Doctor | Rata Aotearoa.

Dr Adam says through its partners it has already heard of NPs who are registered, and services are wanting to employ them. This includes rural employers, with nurses in the pipeline to become NPs over the next two years, who earlier expressed interest in a separate ministry contract for four funded rural NP jobs.

The latest contract is for NPs to be employed in primary health with a “substantive role” in mental health and addictions so as to support access to these services.

Just over $1.05 million a year of the $9.2 million mental health contract is to provide placement support, including salary subsidies, for between six to nine NPs for two consecutive two-year cycles. Eligible employers are general practices, Māori health and iwi providers, Pacific providers and NGOs, including PHOs.

Dr Adams says the level and type of funding support may vary according to the size and needs of the employer but the model is likely to include salary support tailing off in the second year as the NP begins to generate their own income.

The new expanded NPTP programme will be delivered by the University of Auckland, University of Otago and Victoria University under a new contract.

The scheme was first piloted in 2016 by Auckland and Massey universities to support 20 NPs a year complete their NP training through a contract that ends at the close of 2020.

The NPTP scheme offers a more structured and supported final year of NP training for NP candidates, including an employer guarantee of a job on registering, and more hours of supervised clinical practice than the DHB-funded or self-funded study path.

Currently, about 75 new NPs a year are training through the various funding paths which will continue to be offered by the eight university and polytechnic nursing schools with Nursing Council-approved master of nursing programmes that lead to NP registration.

Dr Adams says the project aims to get up to 10 Māori NPs a year into NPTP and will be working to create a pipeline to support potential Māori and Pacific NPs through their postgraduate studies to become NPs.

Enrolled nurses (ENs) are not trained in any of the project’s partner university nursing schools so they will be working with Ara and Northtec to find ENs for the new primary care places, says Dr Adams.

She says the EN diploma includes a module in mental health and it understands there are a number of suitable ENs already available for placements.